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Thursday, September 15, 2011

No Phone, No Internet, No Verizon

Verizon's landline service has stopped working. First, they said it would be fixed by mid-September. Now, they say it'll be fixed by the end of October.

My DSL service works intermittently. It only works sometimes. When it does work, it is slow.

Notice the assymetric service contract, with a telephone monopoly.

If you are late sending your check, severe fines and penalties applie.

If they don't give you service, they give you a prorated discount on your bill. They don't have to reimburse you for the inconvenience. They don't have to reimburse you for the time wasted getting them to fix it.

3 comments:

Vargas said...

Those monopolistic assholes have been around for too long. Years ago I ordered a land line installed and the technician never came. Called again, made a second appointment and the technician didn't show up a second time. I called and cancelled the whole thing without a problem. A week later I got a bill for close to $150 for a new line and number I could not even use. The refused to remove the charges. I never paid them and never will. I stick to cable internet and cellular now. They are not missed.

Scott said...

AT&T is exactly the same, that's why I got rid of phones years ago.

The one thing that never goes down is the cable. That's because if people don't get their TV shows they raise holy hell, and a lot of them all at once.

It's funny because regulators claim that VOIP can't be your primary phone since its less reliable. The fact is VOIP works far more reliable than the telephone lines these days. Part of the reason is that since the monopoly was broken up there's not much of an incentive to keep the lines working for some other company, so no one does anything. Tragedy of the commons.

FSK said...

Actually, my parents are mad at Time Warner, because the cable goes out for a few hours a month on average. They were planning to switch to FIOS once that became available in our area.

Now, they're mad at Verizon. The only other choice is ... Time Warner.

That's the beauty of a monopoly/oligopoly. Both can afford to provide lousy service, due to the monopoly. If both decide to give lousy service, customers are SOL.

It's illegal for me to lay wires and start my own telephone or cable business.

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